We started next to Ste-Marie chairlift (large parking) where the first signpost guided us to the north (Lac de Peyrol, la Mayt etc). The path crossed a ski run then a wood before we briefly used a narrow paved road before forking left along a dirt track. The ascent was rather steep in places. There were small fields between the larch woods. We passed a place named le Grand Forest then Rebrun. The stretch from here ascended in the woods to a crossroads at 1901 m where we forked left (signpost Lac de Peyrol 2,8 km) following an unpaved road, heading south. The road undulated in a beautiful forest with some small hay fields in places.

We had great views of the valley as well as the Crête de Vars. The summit of Pointe de Razis dominated the landscape in the west. We reached Peyrol (2142 m) and walked past the lake. On the day of our hike the chairlift was not running. There were nevertheless some hikers and tourists who had taken the 4x4’s.

We walked past the chairlift. The ski run was apparently closed for hikers (cattle fence) but a good marked path was shown for hikers back to the valley. The trail was not shown on our map. Another trail just before Peyrol was reserved for mountain  bikers. We used the nice pietons trail (our track image below) which mostly descended in the woods. We crossed the ski run again before reaching our starting point.